


i hate to look into those eyes and see an ounce of pain

by gilligankane



Series: you can tell everybody this is your song [29]
Category: Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-04
Updated: 2018-05-04
Packaged: 2019-05-02 05:52:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14538066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gilligankane/pseuds/gilligankane
Summary: “Oh, for God’s sake,” Waverly spits. “Grow up.”Wynonna shakes her head, laughing to herself as she looks down. “I’m going to have to, aren’t I?” Her voice is hoarse again, like it was on the roof.“Wynonna,” Nicole says, eyes flashing at Waverly. “You don’t have to do this.”





	i hate to look into those eyes and see an ounce of pain

**Author's Note:**

> One minute, it's September 1997 and then it's March 1998. When things are moving too fast, it takes a village to make them just a little bit easier.

**“Sweet Child o’ Mine” Guns N’ Roses, 1987  
** _ She's got a smile that it seems to me reminds me of childhood memories, where everything was as fresh as the bright blue sky. Now and then, when I see her face, she takes me away to that special place, and if I'd stare too long, I'd probably break down and cry. _

Nicole pauses on the lawn, a hand up against her eyes to block out the blinding light. Her sunglasses are sitting on the dashboard of her Bonneville, but she’s too tired to walk back across the driveway to get them. It takes her a minute to adjust to the sharp glare of the setting sun, Wynonna’s shape hazy before coming into focus.

“What’re you doing up there?” she asks.

Wynonna leans back on her palms. “What does it look like I’m doing? Sitting.”

“Wynonna,” Nicole warns.

Wynonna throws a hand dismissively at her. “Who called you anyway?” she shouts down. “Gus?”

Nicole throws an arm back behind her. “Bumblebear. Called it into the station. I told Nedley I’d take the call after my shift was over.”

Wynonna scoffs, the soft noise carrying down to Nicole’s ears. “Of course it was Bumblebear. What else does she have to do other than spy on the whole neighborhood.”

“She’s head of the Neighborhood Watch in this area,” Nicole reminds her. “It’s kind of the civic duty she signed up to do, so…” Nicole shrugs. “Are you going to come down?”

“No,” Wynonna says sharply.

Nicole feels fourteen again, the McCready house a giant tree, and Wynonna is up as high as she can climb, refusing to come down.

“Then I’m coming up there,” she decides, rubbing her hand against the back of her neck.

“Like hell you are,” Wynonna says. She doesn’t mean it, though, none of the fight in her voice that was there over ten years ago.

Nicole shakes her head and stomps up the front porch steps, letting herself into the house. Gus is at The Patch, picking up the slack Wynonna left behind when she took off in the middle of the dinner shift. Nicole follows the scratchy radio sounds, up the stairs and down the hall into Wynonna’s old bedroom. The walls are bare now, all of her posters rolled up and in boxes in the garage. The bed is gone, at Wynonna’s apartment above The Patch, and there’s soft scratch marks on the floor where the posts used to sit. The radio is playing Lionel Richie’s “Dancing On The Ceiling,” but the signal isn’t strong, and every other word is static. Nicole looks at the open window, the curtain fluttering in the breeze, and her eyes stray below the sill, to the ‘Nicole and Wynonna BFFs 4eva’ scratched into the surface.

_ Gus lost it when she found that _ , Nicole remembers with a crooked smile.

She sticks her head out of the window and sighs. “Are you really going to make me come out there?”

Wynonna ignores her, rolling her shoulders forward and hunching in on herself.

Nicole stretches her arm out, leaning out of the window, and flicks Wynonna in the arm, finding the bare skin just below the sleeve of her shirt.

Wynonna pulls her arm across her chest and looks back over her shoulder at Nicole, scowling. “What the hell?”

“It’s too cold to be out here in short sleeves,” Nicole says.

Wynonna rolls her eyes. “What’re you? My mom?” She looks back across the front lawn, turning her back to Nicole. “It’s  _ September _ . There’s barely even a breeze.”

Wynonna isn’t wrong. It’s unseasonably warm for the end of September, and Nicole wonders if she should be paying more attention when Jeremy talks about ‘global warming’ and the state of the environment.

Nicole shakes her head.  _ Don’t let Wynonna change the subject _ , she tells herself. Nicole bends her leg, struggling to get it through the window frame.

She was shorter the last time they climbed out onto the roof, a few months after Curtis died. Wynonna had a habit of climbing up into places she knew no one but Nicole would chase after her. If she wasn’t in their tree, she was on the roof, eyes glazed over as she stared out across the neighborhood. Nicole remembers riding up on her bike and finding Gus on the lawn, hollering at Wynonna to get down. Nicole was the only one who would follow her up there, sitting for hours before she convinced her to come down.

She finally gets the sole of her new Red Wing Irish Setters - a wedding gift from her mom - onto the roof tar. She inches down the slope, using her hands to steady herself, and sighs when she sits down next to Wynonna.

“Bumblebear thought you were going to jump,” Nicole says lightly.

Wynonna scoffs. “As if.”

“Then what’re you doing up here?”

Wynonna looks away, down the street towards the center of town. Nicole sighs; she didn’t think it would be that easy. She leans back, stretching her legs out. She’s going to try and ignore that she’s probably ruining her jeans - the tar is probably cutting into the denim and it’s definitely going to stain it. She lifts her hands and frowns when her palms come up dirty.

She stays quiet for a long time. The sounds of Purgatory haven’t changed much in twelve years - she can still hear the insects in the grass, settling in for the night; the soft  _ hoot _  of an owl not too far away; the radio crackling from behind her in Wynonna’s room; the soft rumble of cars and horns from Main Street. She closes her eyes and smiles softly, taking it all in.

_ This _  is home.

She searches for something to say. There’s a heaviness in the air that’s not just the September, end-of-summer humidity and her brain feels foggy. “Married life isn’t much different,” she finally says.

Wynonna looks at her, eyes narrowed. “What?”

“Married life,” Nicole repeats. “It’s not really different than  _ before _ -married life.”

Wynonna shakes her head. “Well, duh. You two have been married for, like, years.”

Nicole shrugs. “I guess.”

“ _ I guess _ ,” Wynonna repeats with a sneer. “You guys are more of a married couple than anyone I know. Like… Like Gus and Curtis. Even before you were married. Before you were  _ together _ .”

Nicole picks at a loose shingle. “Yeah,” she breathes out, her chest tightening a little. “I guess you’re right.”

Wynonna is quiet for a long moment before she sighs heavily. “Did you  _ want _  it to be different?”

Nicole looks up, frowning. “What?”

Wynonna continues to stare at her. “Did you want it to be different?” she repeats. “Because you brought it up, and you’re doing that thing with your voice when you’re saying something without really saying something, if you know what I mean.”

Nicole shakes her head slowly. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Wynonna rolls her eyes. “Your voice sounds like the bridge of ‘Life In The Fast Lane’ where the flanger comes in and makes the noise kind of warble a little, you know?”

Nicole frowns and puts her hand on her throat. “It does?”

Wynonna nods. “You didn’t know that?”

“No,” Nicole says slowly.

Wynonna shrugs. “I did,” she says, like she’s known it all her life.

Nicole feels along the column of her throat for a moment before dropping her hand back against the shingles. “Do you think Waverly knows that?”

Wynonna scoffs. “Of course she doesn’t.  _ I’m _  your best friend, remember?”

Nicole frowns and inches closer. “I didn’t forget that.”

Wynonna shifts away from her. “All of the sudden, you’re  _ married _  and I’m in second place.”

Nicole pulls back a bit, her eyes wide. “What?”

“I’ve been up here  _ all day _ !” Wynonna says loudly. Nicole jumps a little. “And you only show up  _ now _ ?”

“I was working,” Nicole reminds her.

Wynonna rolls her eyes. “Yeah, whatever. Ms. Deputy Sheriff, married now and too good for everyone else.”

A flash of irritation cuts through Nicole, but she swallows it back and stays calm.

“Wynonna,” she starts.

“And what’re you doing up here anyway?” Wynonna continues over her. “Shouldn’t you be at home, with your perfect wife, in your perfect apartment, with your perfect dog, and your perfect job?” She spits the word  _ perfect _  like the first time she said  _ fuck _ . “Living your stupid, perfect life?”

Nicole inhales slowly, squinting at the anger in Wynonna’s eyes

“Is there something  _ you _  want to talk about?” Nicole asks. “Because  _ you’re _  doing that thing you do where you pick a fight with me about something so we don’t have to talk about your feelings.”

Wynonna’s mouth opens and closes silently before she turns away from Nicole and glares out across the houses. The sun is setting behind them, reflecting off the windows of the houses on the other side of the street, and Nicole studies the red and yellow-gold hues while she waits for Wynonna to say something.

She sings along in her head to Juice Newton’s “Queen of Hearts” and gets three choruses before Wynonna kicks at a loose shingle. It breaks the silence hanging around them for a moment, the shingle skipping down the roof and hitting the grass soundlessly.

“I don’t do that,” Wynonna finally says, her voice hoarse.

Nicole snorts. “Yes, you do.”

“I don’t,” Wynonna insists.

Nicole turns, tucking a leg up under her body. She stares at Wynonna. “In fifth grade, you got mad that Ms. Rivera assigned partners for our project about cells, and instead of  _ telling me _  you were mad about it, you picked a fight over my  _ Flash Gordon _  cassette.” She pauses. “You  _ broke _  my  _ Flash Gordon _  cassette.”

“I bought you a new one,” Wynonna mumbles.

Nicole rolls her eyes. “And in eighth grade, when I didn’t want to go to Edmonton with you, and Gus would only let you go if I went, too, you-”

“Okay,” Wynonna says sharply. “I get it.”

Nicole nods, satisfied. “So,” she prompts after a minute. “What is it?”

Wynonna looks away from her again, her hand drifting to her waistline. She opens her mouth to say something and snaps it closed again, shaking her head as if she’s talking herself out of opening up.

“I know,” Nicole says gently before Wynonna can open her mouth.

Wynonna swallows hard. “You… You know?”

Nicole smiles softly and reaches out, resting her hand over Wynonna’s.

The pieces were easy to put together once Nicole had all of the evidence laid out in front of her. On her lunch break, she’d take the single manilla envelope out of her desk drawer and spread it out on the small table in the break room, safe from the prying eyes of the bullpen. It was full of pages ripped from her small notebook, single words and phrases jotted down in a hurry and shoved in her pocket for later. She poured over them for weeks, but it didn’t take long to realize the truth.

Wynonna didn’t drink any of that Mötley Brüe at the wedding; she’s been ducking into corners and arguing with Doc when she thinks no one is looking; she started wearing a big jacket even though the days are averaging 23°C and the sun is out long past the street lights turning on at their scheduled time.

Wynonna isn’t wearing a jacket now, and Nicole can see the start of something - of  _ someone _  - under the swell of her shirt.

“You’re pregnant,” Nicole says softly.

Wynonna’s eyes start to water and her lower lip trembles.

“Woah, woah,” Nicole breathes out, sliding across the rough shingles. She feels the fabric of her jeans pull, but she doesn’t care. She grips the sleeve of Wynonnas t-shirt, that grody Black Sabbath World Tour ‘78 shirt that used to belong to Nathan, and draws Wynonna in. “Hey,” she whispers in Wynonna’s ear. “Hey, it’s okay.”

Wynonna sobs, one loose noise that settles in Nicole’s chest heavily, and tucks her head into Nicole’s shoulder. Her hand grips Nicole’s knee tightly, almost painfully. Nicole purses her lips against Wynonna’s forehead.

“It’s okay,” she murmurs over and over. “It’s okay.”

“It’s  _ not _ ,” Wynonna says hoarsely. “It’s  _ not _  okay.”

Nicole runs her free hand through Wynonna’s hair, brushing it back off her face, behind her ears. “You’re not going to hit me, are you?” she asks lightly.

Wynonna laughs sharply. “No,” she hiccups, sitting up and scrubbing a hand over her face. “Not this high up, at least.”

“I appreciate it,” Nicole says flatly. She smiles softly, ducking her head to meet Wynonna’s eyes. “It  _ is _  okay,” she promises.

Wynonna sighs heavily. “We weren’t trying. It was… It was an accident. But just before the wedding, I took the test, like, a hundred times, and...”

Nicole doesn’t say anything, still running her fingers through Wynonna’s hair easily. Wynonna leans into it, her eyes fluttering closed just a little. If Nicole closes her eyes, she almost feels like she’s back in Wynonna’s bed a week after the funeral, trying to get Wynonna to stop thrashing in her sleep and settle. It had taken almost an hour - singing through both sides of Metallica’s  _ Ride the Lightning _  - before Wynonna’s body had gone slack and she started snoring.

“I keep taking tests, just to see if one of them will tell me I’m not pregnant and this is just some really killer prank everyone is playing on me,” Wynonna admits. “But every test is positive. I’m… I’m  _ pregnant _ ,” she breathes out, her voice tinted with realization. She claps a hand over her mouth. “Oh, my god,” she says, muffled. “I’m pregnant.”

Nicole hums along to the radio - “And She Was” by the Talking Heads is playing now - and slows her fingers in Wynonna’s hair. “What does Doc think?” she asks quietly.

“John Henry is over the moon,” Wynonna finally says bitterly. “He started going on about how ‘ _ darling little girls would look in blue and boys in pink _ ’ and a whole bunch of other bunk about little hats.”

Nicole snorts softly. “Little hats.”

“Talking about names and finances and how he’ll speak to Old Man Bustillos about getting an advance so he can get materials to build baby furniture,” Wynonna continues. Her eyes are glazed over, lost as she talks. “It was like he won the lottery. All of the sudden, he wouldn’t shut up.”

“But you wanted him to shut up,” Nicole guesses.

“Just for one minute,” Wynonna says, her voice strained. “I just wanted to  _ think, _  and I couldn’t think when he was hammering on and on about where we’re going to put crib in our apartment.” She shakes her head. “He never shuts up about it, either. The other day, I was sleeping, and when I woke up, he was talking to my stomach. My stomach!”

“He also talks to cars,” Nicole says gently. “I think talking to your stomach is an improvement.”

Wynonna elbows her gently.

“I’m just saying,” Nicole defends. “I thought he was going to pull a  _ Christine _  and the cars would start talking back and next thing you know, I’d have to arrest Doc for following out the orders of his murderous cars.”

Wynonna sags heavily into her side again. “You need to stop watching so much television.”

“See?” Nicole whispers against Wynonna’s hair. “Total mom material.”

“I’ll be a  _ terrible _  mother,” Wynonna argues. “Look at Waverly. Look what I did to her.”

Nicole frowns. “Hey, that’s my wife you’re talking about.”

“Yeah, your wife. Who is constantly worried people are going to leave her behind.  _ I  _ did that.”

“Your mother did that,” Nicole says sharply. “Your mother did that to both of you.”

“I left Waverly, too,” Wynonna says miserably.

“But you came  _ back _ ,” Nicole says. She grabs Wynonna’s hands in her own, squeezing them hard. “Every time, you came back.”

“I’m-”

Nicole moves her hands to Wynonna’s shoulders, pressing down hard, trying to ground Wynonna in something, so high up on this roof. She searches her eyes, her heart in her throat.  _ Wynonna’s afraid _ , she thinks to herself.  _ She’s afraid to mess it up _ .

“What am I going to do?” Wynonna asks breathlessly, that fear back in her voice. “I can’t… How do  _ I _  raise a baby?”

Nicole thinks about it for a moment, working her hand back into Wynonna’s, lacing their fingers together. “With Doc. And me. And Waverly. And Gus, and Mercedes, and Nathan, and-”

“Okay, okay,” Wynonna cuts her off. “It takes a village, I get it.”

“You  _ have _  a village,” Nicole promises. “We’re little and we’re scrappy, and some of us still don’t know how we got this far, but we’re  _ yours _ . All of us.”

She knows that she’s making promises for other people. She knows that she’s speaking for Waverly and Mercedes and Nathan and Chrissy and Perry and Dolls and Jeremy and Rosita and Doc, and she’s promising things that might not be hers to promise. But she thinks about the way they’ve always rallied for each other; how they all took turns babysitting Hayley when Mercedes and Nathan had to go to Mercedes’s great-uncle’s funeral; how they came together for Nicole’s wedding; how Perry slept on everyone’s couch when he fought with Chrissy a few years back; how they meet for breakfast almost every Saturday, no matter what is going on; how they care about each other.

“All of us,” Nicole repeats firmly.

Wynonna starts to cry again, heavy tears streaming down her cheeks and dripping off her chin. “I don’t think I can do it,” she sobs.

Nicole pulls her closer, resting her chin on Wynonna’s forehead. “You can,” she whispers. “You don’t have to do it alone, okay?”

Wynonna nods silently, her chin against Nicole’s neck. Nicole leans back slowly, taking Wynonna with her. She feels the rough, sun-warm shingles against her shirt and tries not to worry too much about how she’ll definitely need to throw this shirt out later. Wynonna settles into Nicole’s side, her head pillowed on Nicole’s arm.

“And, like, honestly,” Nicole admits. “If  _ Mercedes _  can rock being a mom, so can you.”

Wynonna snorts. “How did that even happen?”

Nicole keeps her face blank, fighting the urge to grin. “I would think you already know how, but if you need a science lesson, then okay. See, when sperm and-”

Wynonna claps a hand over her mouth. “Don’t,” she hisses. “I  _ never _  want to hear you say ‘sperm’ again.” Her eyes widen a little. “And  _ don’t _  lick my hand.”

Nicole pulls her tongue back into her mouth, rolling her eyes.

Wynonna lets go slowly, eyes narrowed suspiciously. “I’m going to have nightmares of you saying that.”

Nicole shudders. “I’m going to have nightmares  _ thinking _  about saying it.”

Wynonna turns her attention back up at the sky, letting the last bits of sunset wash over her. “Styx is pretty perfect,” she mumbles after a few minutes.

Nicole smiles crookedly. “I know. You tell him enough.”

“I don’t want to tell anyone yet,” Wynonna breathes.

“You don’t have to.”

“They’ll figure it out eventually,” Wynonna continues. “I’m already three months. And  _ John Henry _  can’t keep his mouth shut.”

Nicole laughs softly. “No, he can’t. I’m surprised he hasn’t taken an ad out in the paper.”

Wynonna tips her head back to see Nicole and glares. “Don’t give him any ideas.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Nicole says quickly.

“Waverly is going to lose it,” Wynonna sighs. “Gus, too.”

“They’re going to be  _ happy _  for you,” Nicole corrects. “If you want them to be happy, that’s what they’ll be.” She sucks in her bottom lip nervously, picking at her thumb. “Do you…” She trails off, shaking her head slightly. “I mean, do you want…” She takes a deep breath. “Do you want to keep it?”

Wynonna’s head snaps up almost painfully. “Of course I do.”

Nicole exhales slowly. “Okay. Good.” She gives Wynonna a steady smile. “I would have supported you if you didn’t want to, though.”

Wynonna sinks back down against her. “I know,” she says quietly. Her arm goes around Nicole’s middle, gripping her belt tightly.

If Nicole closes her eyes, she’s fourteen and the funeral is over and Wynonna doesn’t want to come out of her room and she won’t let anyone but Nicole in; she’s fourteen and Wynonna is falling apart, sobbing into Nathan’s dress shirt, too big on Nicole’s scrawny arms; she’s fourteen and Wynonna’s world has just ended.

_ Now, I’m twenty-six and everything is just beginning _ , she thinks.

“What’re you two doing up there?” someone shouts from below them.

Wynonna groans. “It’s your perfect wife.”

Nicole grins, shoving Wynonna gently. “Yes, it is.” She pauses, her elbows digging into the shingles. “Hey.”

Wynonna looks at her and rolls her eyes, pressing her hand into Nicole’s thigh as she sits up. “Don’t even.”

“I just want to say-”

“You don’t need to say it.”

Nicole grins widely. “Yes, listen. I-”

“No,” Wynonna says loudly, sticking her finger in her ear. “La la la la.”

“I love you,” Nicole sings.

“ _ La la la la la _ ,” Wynonna says louder.

“What the hell is wrong with you two?” Waverly shouts up at them.

Nicole throws her arms around Wynonna’s neck. “I love you,” she says again.

“La la la la!”

Waverly stamps her foot down against the sidewalk. “Get down from there before you fall.”

Nicole sits back and holds her hand up in surrender. “Okay, okay.”

Wynonna eyes her warily and scoots a meter away.

Waverly sighs heavily, the noise drifting up to them. “Bumblebear called and said there were two idiots on the roof - one who’d been there all day, and the other who was supposed to get her down. I can guess which idiot you are,” she says to Nicole, a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth.

“Yours,” Nicole sings. “Hold on, we’re coming down.” She grabs Wynonna’s arm and tugs her back towards the window.

Wynonna flips off the radio as they leave her room, feet stomping down the stairs in unison. She pauses at the bottom of the stairs, turning back and stopping Wynonna on the step.

“I love you,” she says seriously.

Wynonna looks away, rolling her eyes. “Okay, I get-”

“No,” Nicole says firmly. “You don’t. But I do. And I’m here.” She reaches out, her hand resting on Wynonna’s shoulder. She squeezes gently, trying to remember what it felt like to be the person in Wynonna’s place years ago, heart in her throat and fear in the pit of her stomach. “I just want you to know that, okay?” She swallows hard. “And I won’t stop. The people who matter, they won’t stop, okay?”

Wynonna’s eyes are wet when she looks up at Nicole. “Promise?”

“I promise,” Nicole breathes out. She nods, promising herself, too. “I’m going to keep you on track.”

 

-

Nicole waits until everyone has their backs turned, looking towards the stereo where the music has stopped, before she lunges for the pint of Molson on the card table. She takes a long sip and puts it down, wiping at her mouth with the back of her hand and sitting back quickly. The alcohol sloshes uncomfortably in her stomach as she moves and she hides the wince by adjusting her baseball hat, moving the brim back and forth before letting it settle in the same place it was before she touched it.

“Wow,” Chrissy says as she looks back down at the card table, fanning the cards in her hand back and forth. “Wynonna, you’re, like, whipping through the drinks tonight.”

Wynonna smiles widely, just a bit too brightly to be real. “Thirsty,” she says.

Chrissy shrugs a shoulder and nods at Waverly. “Hit me.”

Wynonna’s eyes narrow as she glances at Nicole, her mouth twisted into a scowl.  _ Slow down _ , her eyes seem to say.  _ People are getting suspicious _ .

Nicole rolls her eyes and looks away.  _ Secret-keeping is getting old _ , she thinks to herself.  _ And beer doesn’t even taste good anymore _ . She looks sadly at her second Moosehead, barely touched. Her stomach is sour with Molson and her mouth feels like the inside of a cardboard box.

Wynonna’s body jerks and Waverly hisses.

“Who just kicked me?” Waverly asks, reaching under the table to rub at her leg.

“Nicole,” Wynonna says quickly.

Nicole’s mouth drops open, her cheeks flushing when Waverly turns to glare at her. “Leg cramp,” she manages. “Uh, hit me?”

Waverly lifts up off the couch, over the coffee table, and swats Nicole in the arm. “There.”

Nicole rubs at her arm, wincing slightly. “I meant give me another card,” she says slowly.

“I know what you meant,” Waverly says flatly. She tosses a card down in front of Nicole, letting it flutter off the table. “There,” she repeats.

Nicole leans over and picks up the card, reaching further past it and pinching at the skin between the cuff of Wynonna’s jeans and the top of her sock. Wynonna’s leg jumps, her knee hitting the bottom of the card table. The pint glasses on the top rattle, and Nicole’s Moosehead sloshes over the side.

“Hey!” Wynonna shouts. She twists away from Nicole’s hands. “ _ Watch it _ . Precious cargo.”

Nicole freezes, her arm still outstretched and suspended between them. Wynonna’s eyes widen. Waverly tips her head to one side, looking like Styx staring at the nature documentaries Waverly likes to watch sometimes. Mercedes looks between Wynonna and Nicole curiously. Rosita and Chrissy look at each other, twin frowns on their faces.

“I thought you were going for my tits,” Wynonna finally says.

Waverly wrinkles her nose. Rosita rolls her eyes. Chrissy snorts and picks all of the cards up off the table, stacking them in her hand to shuffle them.

“As if,” Nicole manages, her throat tightening around the words.

“I’m next in line, Loverboy,” Mercedes says, winking. She shimmies her shoulders suggestively.

“No way,” Nicole says firmly. She sits back in her seat, glancing up to try and catch Waverly’s eye. Waverly looks down at her fingernails, picking at her nail bed.

Chrissy shuffles, creating the bridge and letting the cards ripple together. She cradles them in one hand, about to deal them out, but she pauses. “Who wants a snack break?”

Rosita pushes out of her chair before Chrissy is done asking. “I need to pee before I pop a button or something.”

“I want more of that fruit dip,” Mercedes decides, picking up her pint glass and draining the rest of the beer.

“I used a different base this time,” Waverly says as she stands up, following Mercedes out of the living room where they’ve set up. “Cream cheese, instead of yogurt.”

Chrissy trails after both of them, balancing a mixing bowl filled with empty beer cans. “Nicole, pick the next CD?” she calls over her shoulder.

“Not on your life,” Nicole mumbles. She won’t even touch them if she can help it; she hates having the Girls Poker Spectacular at Chrissy and Perry’s house. The music always sucks.

Instead, she sits back in her seat, exhaling noisily. She presses her hand delicately against her stomach and winces. She wonders if she should go get some pretzels to soak up the two and a half beers she’s already had. She looks up at Wynonna.

Wynonna holds her eyes for a moment and then looks silently at the pint of Molson.

Nicole shakes her head.  _ No _ , she tries to say.  _ I don’t want to _ .

Wynonna jerks her head towards the pint again, her eyes glancing back at the doorway to the kitchen.

“No,” Nicole hisses under her breath.

“ _ Nicole _ ,” Wynonna growls.

Nicole makes a face, her hand clenched tight into a fist.

Wynonna’s eyebrows lift high. “Nicole,” she says again. She glares at the glass.

Nicole growls softly and curses under her breath, grabbing the pint glass and finishing the last, warm sip in one swallow. She nearly gags, the mouthful more foam than beer, but swallows that down, too.

“What’re you doing?” Waverly asks.

Nicole turns quickly, the beer sloshing again in her stomach. It feels sour now, like she’s going to be sick all over her shoes like she was the first time she tried beer, a  Niagara Falls Eisbock, with Nathan.

“Drinking?” Wynonna says slowly.

Waverly ignores Wynonna, eyes narrowed and focused on Nicole.

“Drinking?” Nicole repeats, looking at Wynonna. She frowns. “It’s part of the rules, isn’t it? The Poker Spectacular is a night for  _ drinking _ , dips, and no-” She stops herself before she gets to the last word, shuddering.

“Dicks,” Wynonna supplies happily. “It’s a good slogan.”

“It’s a stupid slogan,” Nicole says quickly. “No one likes it.”

“I like it,” Mercedes says, holding two beers cans stacked on top of each other in one hand, a bag of Cheezies in the other. She jerks her arm up, the top can of Molson tumbling down into Wynonna’s lap. “I would have gotten you one, but you’ve barely finished your second.”

Waverly crosses her arms over her chest, still glaring. “You don’t like Molson.”

“Wynonna doesn’t like the last sip,” Nicole says.

Waverly’s jaw tenses. “What’s going on?”

“Nada.”

”Nothing.”

Waverly’s mouth forms a small ‘o’ as she looks back and forth between them again. “You’re lying.” She jabs a finger in their direction, waving it back and forth. “So spill.”

Nicole winces, looking at Wynonna. She bites down on her bottom lip. “I…”

Wynonna shakes her head quickly. “Nicole,” she says. Her eyes are wide, fear creeping in at the edges.

Nicole takes a deep breath, setting her shoulders straight. Wynonna isn’t ready, and that’s fine. “It’s nothing,” she repeats, her voice firm. She narrows her eyes, daring Waverly to ask again. She’s panicking, really, because she’s never been good at keeping secrets - not  _ from _  Waverly.

“What’s going on?” Rosita asks, a Cheezie sticking out of her mouth.

Wynonna throws her hands up in the air. “I’m leaving Doc.”

Nicole’s eyes widen. Chrissy drops an unopened Orange Crush on the hardwood floor. Mercedes chokes on the sip of beer in her mouth. The Cheezie between Rosita's lips falls soundlessly.

“For Nicole,” Wynonna continues. “She finally confessed her love, and we’re running away together.”

Everyone groans. Mercedes flips them off and Chrissy picks up her soda can, frowning at it.

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Waverly spits. “ _ Grow up _ .”

Wynonna shakes her head, laughing to herself as she looks down. “I’m going to have to, aren’t I?” Her voice is hoarse again, like it was on the roof.

“Wynonna,” Nicole says, eyes flashing at Waverly. “You don’t have to do this.”

Wynonna shrugs a shoulder, still looking at the card table. She takes a deep breath, her shoulders rising and falling. When she looks up, she looks only at Nicole, swallowing hard.

Nicole nods slowly, but Wynonna looks away again, focusing on something just over Nicole’s shoulder. Nicole can see Rosita getting impatient, trying hard to chew the new Cheezie she picked out of the bowl noiselessly.

“The rabbit died,” Wynonna finally says.

Chrissy drops her Orange Crush again.

“What?” Mercedes asks. “What did you just say?”

“Like, the one down at the pet store?” Rosita asks. “Because I  _ swear _  that Gerry Phillips bought that thing last week for his-” She stops, her eyes going wide. “Oh.  _ Oh _ .”

Waverly steps forward, her eyes still narrowed in confusion. “But that would mean that you’re…”

“Knocked up,” Wynonna supplies. “Got a bun in the oven. Harbouring a fugitive.  _ In the family way _ .”

“Pregnant,” Waverly breathes out.

Wynonna winces - just barely, but Nicole sees it in the curve of her shoulders and the wrinkle of her nose. “You always were the smart Earp, kid,” she says defensively.

Nicole can practically hear the hammer going as Wynonna constructs her walls around herself. She curls her hand into a fist, her fingernails cutting into her palm as she looks across the room at Waverly.

Waverly’s frown fades into awe, her eyes soft. “You’re pregnant,” she breathes out.

Wynonna nods slowly. “Maybe you  _ aren’t _  the smart Earp…”

“Oh my  _ god _ , you’re  _ pregnant _ ,” Waverly says a third time. She smiles, a wide and bright smile that stretches across her face. She claps her hands together, bouncing on the tips of her toes. “You’re pregnant!”

Wynonna winces again, this time exaggerated. Nicole can see the hint of a smile as she ducks her head, a hand on the soft swell of her stomach. “Did you ever fall off the top of that pyramid and hit your head?” She narrows her eyes, grinning now. “It would explain how you’ve been in love with Nicole all these years.”

Nicole scowls.

Waverly drops to her knees in front of Wynonna. “You’re pregnant.”

“And you sound like a scratched CD,” Wynonna says.

“A  _ scratched _  CD,” Nicole hisses.

“You’re having a  _ baby _ ,” Waverly says.

Wynonna starts to frown. “Are you having a stroke?” She looks at Nicole. “Is she having a stroke?”

“Wynonna,” Waverly scolds softly, her hands reaching for Wynonna’s stomach. She pauses, looking for Wynonna’s permission before she rests her hands over Wynonna’s shirt. She gasps softly, her eyes wide and wet at the corners. “You’re having a baby.”

“I know,” Wynonna says quietly. “I’m gonna… I’m gonna be a mom.”

Waverly kneels on the floor and laughs, the sound wet and choked. “You’re going to be a mom.”

“And you’re going to be an aunt,” Wynonna says. She looks around hesitantly. “All… All of you are going to be aunts, if that’s what you want.”

Chrissy smiles widely. Rosita leans against the back of the couch, her hand on Wynonna’s shoulder. Mercedes sits down next to Wynonna, taking her hand.

“Of course we want that. You know,” Mercedes starts. “It takes a village.”

Wynonna smiles softly at Nicole. “Yeah. I’ve heard that somewhere.”

“So…” Nicole breaks the silence and chews on her bottom lip for a moment as everyone turns to her. “Now that everyone knows… “ She nods at the can of Molson. ”Can I stop drinking this shit? Because I think I’m gonna ralph.”

 

-

“I believe that if you just-”

“Say  _ pivot _  one more time,” Nicole growls. “And I’ll pivot my ass around and go up these stairs and let this stupid crib crush you.”

Doc’s hat bobs behind the rail of the crib as he nods. “Yes, well then.”

Nicole pants, dropping the crib onto the step. Her foot gets stuck under the leg, but she barely feels it. “Why did you put it together  _ before _  we got it up the stairs?”

Doc takes off his hat, resting it on the endpost of the crib. He mops at his forehead with a handkerchief he pulls out of his pocket. “This was Waverly’s crib, I am told.”

Nicole stares at him expectantly. “And it can’t be taken apart?”

Doc looks away from her. “I suppose that is an answer.”

“Doc,” Nicole says, her back teeth grinding together.

“I could not take it apart,” Doc finally admits. Something clatters, and Nicole’s mouth drops when she realizes he’s stomping his foot. “I can take a car apart and put it back together again, but I have been defeated by the almighty evil that is children’s furniture!”

“Slow down, Eastwood,” Nicole shouts over him. She sighs and leans back, trying to figure out a solution. “We’ll go back down the stairs and I’ll take it apart.” She nods, determined. “That’s what we’ll do.” Over the pieces of wood, she can see the defeat on his face. “Listen, I helped Nathan build one of these, okay? You just stand there, all pretty-like, and hand me the tools, and we’ll get it done in no time.”

Doc sniffs lightly as he picks his end of the crib back up. “I  _ am _  pretty.”

“I know,” Nicole mumbles as she picks her end up off her foot. A rush of blood floods the area, and she winces as she steps down on it again. “God,” she breathes out softly, talking to herself. “That baby is going to be good-looking.”

They get back down the stairs easier than they got up them, Doc only nicking the end of the narrow hallway, just above the railing, at the very bottom. He freezes, eyes wide, but Nicole waves him off with a promise of telling Gus  _ she  _ did it; it’ll be easier that way.

It comes apart easily, and Nicole spends the entire twenty minutes it takes glaring at the back of Doc’s head. A few screws are stripped, so she uses the pliers to yank them out, and sends Doc to Wynonna’s office to grab a few replacements from the junk drawer of small objects that’s in there. Once the pieces are separated, it takes two trips to get up the stairs with everything, and Nicole holds up a hand when Doc tries to apologize.

“Just… Okay, Mr. Mechanic. Do you know what an hex key looks like?”

Doc pulls himself up to his full height and nods sharply. “I am at your service.”

Nicole nods at the side of the crib, propped up against the wall in Wynonna and Doc’s apartment. They haven’t done anything else to make the apartment baby-friendly; Doc had insisted they get a crib first and start there. She knows Doc wants to buy most of the necessities himself, but the crib is a gift from Gus, one passed down through the Earps for generations.

“Then let’s get going,” she tells him.

The sides take no time to put back together, but she stares at the metal spring sheet that’s supposed to sit beneath the mattress. She’s going to need to be on the floor for this. She looks down at her freshly ironed jeans and her new flannel that Waverly got her, blue and white, and sighs. “Do you have one of those wheelie things? And maybe a sheet?”

Doc runs down the stairs, one hand on his hat to keep it from flying away, and comes back up with a mechanic’s creeper and a set of coveralls. “Will these do?”

Nicole looks up from rolling the sleeves of her flannel, and looks them over, finally nodding. She sighs again.

“Flathead,” she calls, sticking her hand out from under the crib. Something cool and flat is dropped into her palm. She twists the screwdriver around and around, tightening the screw she just hand-placed.

She sticks her hand back out from under the crib, the other hand holding up the metal spring sheet she’s attaching. “Phillips.”

Doc slaps a screwdriver down into her hand, and she works quickly, her fingertips burning from trying to hand-screw as much of the spring sheet in as she could. A screw drops and she picks it up, holding it in her mouth while she tightens the next one in the sequence. It takes a couple of hard twists, but when she slowly lets go of the spring sheet, it stays firmly in place, attached to the frame of the crib.

Nicole shimmies back, the creeper doing most of the work. She has to wiggle around a bit, the sleeve of the coverall catching in the wheel. She clears the bottom of the crib and sits up, stretching her arms above her head and twisting her core. Her back aches, and she wonders how Doc does this all day, sliding under cars.

“Next piece,” she calls, reaching back blindly.

Something cold and wet lands in her hand, and she almost drops it.

“I do apologize,” Doc says quickly. “I thought it best to take a beverage break.”

Nicole blinks at the Orange Crush in her hand for a moment. “Thank God,” she breathes out, popping the tab back and breaking the seal. She takes a long sip, gulping it down and ignoring the tears in her eyes as the carbonation bubbles.

“You have done a mighty fine job,” Doc says, surveying what they’ve managed to assemble. “That crib is-”

“Upside down,” Nicole breathes out, her hand going slack. She catches her soda can before it hits the floor. “Jesus Christ on a-”

“I beg your pardon?” Doc asks, putting down his own Ginger Ale. He frowns, tipping his head to the side, and scans the crib. “It looks mighty fine to me,” he repeats.

“The left side is on upside down,” Nicole says. She swallows back the anger building in her throat. “I put the left side on  _ upside down _ .”

Doc growls. “Defeated again by an unworthy adversary.”

Nicole presses the heel of her hand against her forehead, trying to push back the headache starting to pound behind her eyelids. “It’s  _ baby _  furniture,” she hisses. “How is it  _ this _  hard?”

She puts her soda down, slamming it a little harder than necessary against the kitchen table top, the same one she ate at when she lived here. “It’s not going to win,” she vows. “Not if I have anything to say about it.”

Not when she’s practically sweat through her flannel and her white undershirt; not when her jeans are creased in the wrong direction; not when she  _ could _  be with Waverly at The Patch instead of keeling over in Wynonna’s apartment, about to set a crib on fire.

“Come hell or high water,” Doc swears, putting his soda down gently.

“Flathead,” Nicole says, her back teeth grinding together.

Doc slaps the screwdriver down into her hand.

She points it at him, eyes narrowed. “And no one knows about this. You hear me, cowboy?”

Doc tips his hat. “Loud and clear, Deputy Sheriff. Loud and clear.”

 

-

Nicole leans in, her mouth against Waverly’s ear. “You look very cute in yellow.”

Waverly jumps, the paintbrush in her hand skipping along the wall. She looks back over her shoulder, eyes narrowed in mock-anger. The look loses its  _ oomph _  as Nicole takes in the yellow paint speckled across Waverly’s face and down over the shirt she wore, the one with the hole in the hem. “Don’t make me mess up.”

“Or what?” Nicole asks.

Waverly turns around completely, holding the paintbrush out in front of her body. She wiggles it lightly, paint flecks splattering on the ground at Nicole’s feet.

“You wouldn’t,” Nicole says, taking a step back.

Waverly takes a step forward. “Wanna bet?”

“Waverly,” Nicole warns. She takes another step back, side-stepping a paint tin on the floor. The drop cloths they borrowed from the garage are slick under the sole of her Chippewa boots, and she nearly stumbles back, eyes still on the brush in Waverly’s hand.

“Nicole,” Waverly mocks. She waves the brush side to side - more paint splatters at Nicole’s feet, nearly landing on top of her boot.

“Don’t do it,” Nicole says.

“Don’t do what?”

“I’m warning you.”

Waverly grins wickedly, one side of her mouth tugging higher than the other. “And what’s my punishment if I don’t listen?”

“Dude, don’t be so grody,” Wynonna says loudly.

Nicole pauses, eyes darting to the other side of the room. Wynonna is on the couch, feet propped up on one arm, her back against the other. She’s flipping through the newest issue of  _ Rolling Stone _  - the one with Salt-n-Pep on the front - and there’s a plate of pizza balanced on the bump under her Heart t-shirt.

“My unborn child can’t handle this kind of foreplay. It makes it nauseous,” Wynonna continues.

“And I thought  _ work _  made your unborn child nauseous,” Nicole mutters.

Waverly snorts softly, dropping her arm. A blob of paint glides off the brush and lands on the drop cloth. Nicole grimaces, knowing that could have been her boots or her jeans or her shirt instead of a dusty old piece of canvas.

“Standing, actually,” Wynonna chirps.

Doc swings past her, putting a Ginger Ale down on the canvas-draped coffee table next to her. “Don’t get up,” he warns her. “The doctor said that-”

“I’m seven months pregnant and I need to take advantage of the peace and quiet before I push this monster out of my-”

Waverly clears her throat loudly.

Doc’s cheeks redden. “Just don’t get up,” he repeats.

“She wasn’t going to,” Nicole points out.

Wynonna pulls the  _ Rolling Stone _  down over her chest, eyes narrowed. “You volunteered,” she reminds Nicole.

Nicole shakes her head. “ _ Waverly _  volunteered.  _ I  _ wanted to do nothing this weekend,” she fires back.

Wynonna smiles at her, all of her teeth showing. She pats her stomach gently. “Don’t worry about your Aunt Nicole,” she says, looking down. “She’s a hoser.”

Nicole pulls her wrist back like she’s going to flick it forward, spraying Wynonna with paint.

Wynonna holds the magazine up. “I’ll use it a shield, don’t think I won’t.”

Nicole scowls. “I haven’t even gotten to read it yet.”

“And you won’t if you even  _ think _  of aiming any of that paint in my direction,” Wynonna promises.

Nicole looks at Waverly. “Stop letting her read my  _ Rolling Stone _  magazines before me,” she demands. “She’s only looking at the pictures anyway.”

Wynonna shrugs. “They’re my favorite part.”

Waverly brushes past her and pushes up onto her tiptoes, kissing Nicole’s cheek quickly. She continues across the room and pauses in front of the wall they’re painting yellow - something with  _ corn _  or  _ flower _  in the name that Doc picked out at the hardware store. Wynonna had told him to pick something intimidating, and cried when he brought home the can with a large grin on his face. She blamed the crying on the pregnancy hormones, but yelled at Doc when he tried to return it in exchange for matte black.

“You missed a spot,” Wynonna calls to Waverly. “Up there, by the ceiling.”

Waverly pouts. “I can’t reach that.”

Wynonna whistles, the same melody she uses to call Styx across The Patch. “Hey, Stretch. Give your wife a hand.”

Nicole scowls. “I’m going to give you a-”

“I’ve got a chair!” Doc says loudly. He smiles crookedly at them. “I’ve got a chair.”

“Baby,” Waverly sings. “Come here and help me.”

Nicole stomps across the room, narrowly avoiding paint pans and tin tops. She stops next to the chair Doc set up for Waverly and braces her arm against the back of it as Waverly climbs onto the seat. Waverly’s hand is warm on her shoulder where she steadies herself, using Nicole to balance.

“When are we going to give it to her?” Waverly asks out of one side of her mouth, eyes narrowed as she reaches up to paint the spot Wynonna had pointed out.

Nicole looks back over her shoulder at the present she’d hidden under her jacket when they first came into the apartment, back when the walls were white and covered in band posters. Wynonna had carefully and slowly rolled each poster up, making Nicole double-check her precision, and then tucked them into a chest Doc had picked up at a secondhand shop in the city. They had covered the thumbtack marks with yellow paint, and it was  _ nice _ , but it wasn’t  _ Wynonna and Doc _ .

“Now?”

Waverly nods and holds onto Nicole’s shoulder as she gets down off the chair. She pulls the wrapped gift out and passes it to Nicole, nodding in Wynonna’s direction.

Nicole clears her throat. “Uh, we got you something.” She shrugs. “Technically, it’s for Cool Rider, but…” She thrusts the gift out at Wynonna.

Wynonna sits up, reaching for the gift. Nicole tries not to flinch when Wynonna dog-ears the page she’s reading before she puts the magazine down on the couch. She turns the gift over, eyes narrowed as she studies it. Nicole had tried three times to wrap it before she gave up, giving Waverly control.

“I can wrap flat boxes,” Nicole said defensively. “Not  _ cylinders _ .”

Waverly had wrapped it on the first try, and then spent the rest of the night repeating  _ cylinder _  and laughing to herself.

“I was under the impression we had retired ‘Cool Rider’ as a possible nickname,” Doc says. “I, myself, am partial to Knightrider.”

“No one liked that movie,” Wynonna says dismissively. She shakes the gift, frowning when it doesn’t make an noise. “What is it?”

“Open it and find out,” Nicole says impatiently. “God, it’s like Christmas the year you turned 12 all over again.”

Wynonna points the gift at her. “I was practicing  _ patience _  that year. It was Gus’s Christmas gift.”

“You were practicing being  _ annoying, _  and it was your gift to yourself,” Nicole fires back. “Just open the damn thing, would you?”

Wynonna holds her gaze and finds a corner, pulling hard on the newspaper Waverly used to wrap it. She frowns as the gift comes into view, and then looks up at Nicole and Waverly, a confused smile on her face. “What is this?” she asks, even as she keeps peeling back the wrapping. When it’s in a shredded pile on the floor, she holds the gift up, watching as it unfurls.

Nicole had found it in the back of the craft store at the mall, a few weeks ago when Waverly needed to pick up some supplies she ordered. It was part of a larger order someone had returned, the sales clerk had said. And no one wanted a strip of wallpaper - they wanted a whole sheet. Nicole had measured it, though - three cassettes high and a hundred cassettes long. It would fit almost-perfectly on the wall where Nicole and Doc had put the crib and the dresser and changing table.

“Are these…”

“Motorcycles,” Nicole supplies. “Yeah. It’s not a ton of material, and it’s really kind of… decorative? But we couldn’t  _ not _  get it, you know?” She picks at her thumb when Wynonna doesn’t say anything. “You know?” she repeats.

Waverly shrugs a shoulder when Nicole turns to her.

Nicole’s frown deepens when she hears Wynonna sniffle.

“I’m sorry?” she offers. “If you hate it, I can-”

“ _ No _ ,” Wynonna says loudly. “I…” She laughs bitterly. “It’s these damn pregnancy hormones,” she insists as she looks up, wiping at her face. “I cried the other day when Benji Thompson helped Edna Pollard across the street.”

“It was quite the gesture of humanity,” Doc says kindly. He looks up from the wallpaper, and Nicole ignores the way his eyes sparkle, the tears catching the light. “This is… this is perfect.”

Nicole shrugs, self-conscious. “It’s just wallpaper.”

“He’s right,” Wynonna says. “It’s perfect.” She runs her fingers across the vinyl sheet. “Motorcycles.” She snorts. “Some of the boys at the garage want to get a sidecar, just for this one.” She pats her stomach gently. She shakes her head and looks up at Nicole. “It’s perfect. Thank you.”

Nicole shrugs again. “No big. Honest.”

Wynonna grins. “I can’t wait until you guys have a kid. I already have the perfect first CD idea.”

Nicole doesn’t even hear Wynonna mention the compact disc, her brain sputtering on Wynonna’s first sentence.

_ I can’t wait until you guys have a kid _ .

It plays on a loop in her mind for the rest of the night - through a second coat of paint and a few failed attempts and then one successful venture of putting on the wallpaper detail. It plays over the second pizza they order and the  _ Knightrider _  VHS Doc makes them watch. She can still hear the words as she puts the car in park in their driveway, the engine cutting off and leaving her sitting in the car in silence, Waverly just as quiet next to her.

“Are you-”

“About what-”

Nicole shakes her head, licking her lips. “You first.”

Waverly twists in her seat, pulling a leg up under her. “You’ve been quiet all night.”

Nicole’s hands flex against the steering wheel. “Thinking.”

“We didn’t even listen to music on the drive home,” Waverly points out.

Nicole blinks a few times, staring at the tape deck. “We didn’t?”

Waverly’s hand curls around her neck, her fingernails scratching at Nicole’s head. “What’s going on?”

Nicole looks through the windshield, up to the windows of their apartment, a single light blazing behind the curtains Waverly pulled before they left that afternoon. She knows that Styx is inside, probably curled up on the couch with his bear, snoring loudly. She can close her eyes and imagine every small detail of their home - the stereo and the basket by the front door; the magnets on the refrigerator; the order of her shoes in the closet. She can see those same things, years in the future. She can see herself coming through the door after a long shift of training new rookies, leaving her Sheriff’s badge on the kitchen counter. She can see herself patting Styx on the head and tossing him a treat, sneaking up behind Waverly - at her desk, her lamp on, reading glasses she needs, but doesn’t wear enough, pushed into her hair - and kissing the top of her head, stealing a chip off her plate and finishing her glass of water. She can see them going to bed, Styx climbing into bed between them, their hands laced and stretched across the bed.

She just doesn’t see anyone else in her mind.

Waverly moves a little closer, the heat of her body bringing Nicole back to herself. She blinks and smiles crookedly.

“I was thinking about how much I love our life,” she admits.

Waverly nods slowly. “I do, too.”

“I love everything about it,” Nicole continues. “You’re… you’re my  _ wife _ . I don’t think I’m ever going to get tired of saying that.”

“I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of hearing it,” Waverly whispers. She leans in, brushing her lips against Nicole’s. “But something is bothering you,” she murmurs.

Nicole presses her hand to Waverly’s cheek, their foreheads touching. “I think about us all of the time. I’ve always… I’ve always had this  _ idea _  of a future. And you’ve always been in it.” She pauses, letting her eyes close so she doesn’t have to see the look on Waverly’s face when she breaks her heart. “But I never… I never saw kids,” she admits.

Waverly is quiet, just the soft  _ inhale, exhale _  between them. Nicole sings two verses of “I Ran” by Flock of Seagulls before Waverly shifts, her knee pressing into Nicole’s thigh.

“Neither did I,” Waverly whispers.

Nicole’s eyes open. “You… You didn’t?”

Waverly smiles sadly, tucking a loose strand of Nicole’s hair behind her ear. “I love Hayley. And I’m going to love Wynonna and Doc’s baby, but-”

“Cool Rider,” Nicole corrects.

“I’m not calling it that,” Waverly says firmly.

Nicole’s shoulders slump as she pouts.

Waverly ignores her. “I love Hayley, and I know I’m going to love Wynonna and Doc’s baby,” she repeats. “And when I used to imagine my life, I imagined a lot of different things. Mostly you,” she admits. “But not kids. Never kids.”

“Honest?” Nicole asks, afraid to speak louder than a whisper.

“Honest,” Waverly promises. “If we never have kids, that’s okay.”

“We’re really, really good aunts,” Nicole says.

“The  _ best _ ,” Waverly agrees. “We’re, like, the cool aunts who let you stay up past midnight and have marshmallow creme for dinner.” She laughs and drops her forehead down against Nicole’s shoulder. “I’ve only ever needed you. Nothing else.”

Nicole breathes out heavily, feeling the fist in her chest unclench slowly. Something rattles loose, and Nicole can feel tears pushing at the back of her eyes. “But you don’t  _ want _  them, right? Kids, I mean?”

“I don’t want them,” Waverly says firmly. “I want this life, with you and our dog and our niece and our soon-to-be-determined niece or nephew.  _ That’s _  what I want.”

“That’s what I want, too,” Nicole says. “Well, that, and Chinese food for dinner.”

Waverly snorts and rolls her eyes. “Get out of the car.”

“And we can make a mixtape for Cool Rider,” Nicole continues, taking her time reaching for the door handle. “I already made one for if the baby comes out looking like Doc, with a full cowboy hat and everything, but what if the baby is born in motorcycle boots?”

Waverly smacks her in the arm, but pins her to the front door and kisses her hard enough to forget about what she was going to make a mixtape for.

 

-

Nicole flips the sirens on and hits the gas as soon as Doc closes the back door of the cruiser. She checks the rearview mirror too late to be legal, but there’s no one on the road in the middle of the day; perks of a small town running on factory time.

“Buckle up!” she hollers over the wind whipping through the open window.

She peels out of the garage lot and barely flinches when her tires squeal across the pavement. She knows she left rubber behind; she can smell it in the air as she hits the street, but she only pushes on the gas harder and leans over the steering wheel.

Linda had radioed in exactly three minutes and fourteen seconds ago - a call to dispatch from Bustillos and Holliday Motors about a woman going into labor.

“That Holliday boy sounds like he’s going to blow a gasket,” Linda had drawled. “You might want to get over there.”

Nicole had already been in the middle of turning around, patrol route abandoned as soon as Linda mentioned the garage. She flipped her siren on and tore down Main Street, past The Patch and Shorty’s. “Where’s Scoot and Drew?” she asks.

“The Wonder Boys took the bus out to the Belvedere farm. Someone got a horse hoof to the head,” Linda said.

“We need more than one ambulance,” Nicole grumbled.

“Why don’t you get started on that, then, Deputy Sheriff,” Linda fired back. “I’ll tell Nedley you’re off duty as soon as you call in that you’ve got Wynonna and you’re en route to the hospital.”

Nicole had made too wide of a turn into the garage and nearly sideswiped a freshly painted 1995 Chevrolet Beretta. Doc had been pacing outside of the bay doors, his hat in his hands, and Wynonna in an office chair beside him, breathing heavily.

“I believe my office is flooded,” Doc said, his voice unnaturally high.

“My  _ water broke _ , you stupid cowboy,” Wynonna said, her teeth clenched tight. “I’m having a  _ baby _ .”

Doc swallowed hard. “Right. Of course.”

Wynonna gripped Nicole’s arm tightly and used Nicole as leverage, standing up unsteadily. “They sent you?”

“No one else wanted to fight a bear today,” Nicole said lightly. She steadied Wynonna with a hand around her waist. “Lonnie is still scared to be in a  _ hallway _  with you,” she reminded Wynonna.

Wynonna smiled briefly before a wave of pain crested over her and she stopped walking, doubled over as a contraction came and went. “Lonnie is a two-bit-”

“The bag!” Doc shouted. “I shall get the bag.” He took off into the garage, and Nicole winced as she heard the sound of tools hitting the concrete floors. A muffled  _ thump _  followed, and Nicole shook her head; she wasn’t prepared for  _ Doc _  being the disaster today.

“Got the door!” Moses Thorton shouted, pulling the back door to the cruiser open.

Nicole nodded gratefully at Moses, easing Wynonna down into the backseat. Doc flew up behind her, tossing a black duffel bag in through the front passenger window. Waverly had put the bags together and left them all over town - the garage, The Patch, her closet at the high school, the station, Chrissy’s house, Nathan and Mercedes’s, and their own apartment.

“What if you go into labor and you forgot to bring it with you?” Waverly had reasoned. “It’s planning ahead. I’m a planner.”

“You’re a lunatic,” Wynonna had fired back. Nicole had caught her smiling, though, when Waverly turned away.

“Call Rosita,” Doc told Moses. “Tell her to-to… Tell her that-”

Nicole clapped her hand down on Doc’s shoulder roughly, his whole body jerking under her touch. “Get in the car, Doc,” she said. She rounded the front of the cruiser, jabbing her finger in Moses’s direction. “You and Fletch close the place up, and call Rosita to tell her what’s going on.”

Moses nodded, adjusting his blue bandana nervously. “Got it, Officer Haught.”

“She’s a goddamn Deputy Sheriff,” Wynonna yelled from the backseat. “Why does everyone keep calling you-  _ Ah! _ ”

Doc paled.

Nicole slammed the driver’s door shut and leaned across the front seat. “John Henry, if you don’t get in this car  _ right this instant _ , I’ll-”

Doc jumped into the car, slamming the door shut with a  _ thud _ . “My coat!” he shouted, staring in horror at the piece of coat stuck in the door.

“Leave it,” Nicole said, shifting the car into drive. She flipped the sirens on and hit the gas.

Main Street passes in a blur. Nicole can’t hear anything - she’s driving too fast, and the two open windows are creating an air tunnel that’s trapping all the noise. She knows that Wynonna is in the backseat, going through her breathing exercises while Doc tugs uselessly at his coat in the door. Over her shoulder, she can see Wynonna’s face through the metal cage and she grits her teeth, turning hard off of Main Street.

“Linda,” she shouts into her walkie.

“Go ahead, Haught,” Linda says quickly.

“I’ve got Wynonna, and we’re nearly at the hospital.”

The static crackles as Linda pauses. “I told the Sheriff. He said to stay there. Lonnie’ll cover the rest of your shift. He said good luck.”

“Copy,” Nicole says, taking another turn, the hospital just ahead.

She pulls into the ambulance bay, using the far parking spot, and gets out of the car quickly, pocketing her keys. She tugs the back door open and steps over Doc as he tumbles out, popping up and smoothing down his long coat. She ignores him, reaching into the back to grab Wynonna’s hands and help her out.

They walk slowly into the hospital through the Emergency Department doors - a sloppy group. Wynonna is between them, their arms wrapped around her waist to hold her up.

“Nicole!”

Nicole looks up, eyes swimming for a moment before they settle on her mom, standing at the triage counter talking to another nurse.

“Wynonna,” her mom says, looking over. She turns back to the nurse she’s talking to and orders a wheelchair. “How you doing, honey?” She nudges Doc out of the way gently, slipping into his place. Her hand is on Wynonna’s wrist, checking her pulse. A wheelchair comes up beside them, and her mom turns, nodding at it. “Have a seat, have a seat.”

Wynonna sits, her whole body stiffening in pain.

“Her water broke,” Doc says, his voice high and pitchy.

All three of them turn to look at Doc.

Wynonna starts to open her mouth, but Nicole beats her to it. “Contractions. I’m not sure how far apart, though.”

“One ‘Sweet Child o’ Mine’ in between each one,” Wynonna says wearily. She looks up at Nicole.

“So, six minutes,” Nicole translates.

Wynonna shakes her head. “No, the single version, not the album.”

“Five minutes,” Nicole corrects. “Five minutes apart.”

Doc wrings his hat in his hands anxiously.

Her mom smiles. “Well, then let’s get you set up somewhere and get started, shall we?” She winks at Nicole and gets behind the wheelchair, pushing it down the hallway. “I’ll drop you off with our Labor and Delivery department. Doc and Nicole can be in the room with you, once they get you settled, if that’s what you’d like.”

Wynonna tries to turn in her seat, to catch Nicole’s eyes.

“I’m gonna call Waverly and Gus,” Nicole says before she can ask. “As soon as we get to where you’re going to be, I’ll find a payphone and I’ll call them.”

“You have a  _ mobile phone _ ,” Wynonna hisses. “Use it!”

“I don’t know  _ how _ ,” Nicole whispers fiercely. She spares a glance at Doc and rolls her eyes. “Oh, like you have any idea how to.”

“I have no understanding of those newfangled devices,” he admits.

“Did I hit my head and wake up in the stone ages?” Wynonna asks. “We live in the 20th Century! Learn how to use a mobile phone!”

The wheelchair slows in front of an open room. “Give us a few minutes?” her mom asks, looking at Doc and Nicole. “I’ll let you know when you can go in. There’s a small room right around the corner with payphones.”

“I’ll go call,” Nicole says. She crouches down at Wynonna’s side. “We’re right here, okay? We’re not going anywhere.”

Wynonna grabs her by the collar of the shirt, yanking her forward. “I want you to go climb a goddamn-”

Joan gently peels Wynonna’s fingers off Nicole’s uniform shirt and pats Nicole’s cheek. “Go on, sweetie.” She wheels Wynonna into the room and closes the door softly behind them.

Doc presses some loose change into her hand. “I’m going to wait here,” he says.

“I’ll be right around the corner,” she promises. She finds the payphones easily, slipping the coins into the slot and punching in the number for the high school. It takes her a minute to get Waverly on the phone - Ms. Anderson in the office still doesn’t like her, no matter how many times Nicole smiles at her when she picks Waverly up from work or when they see each other at The Patch or in the grocery store.  _ Some grudges never die _ , she thinks as she waits for Waverly’s voice on the other end of the line.

“Hello?”

Nicole looks behind her, at the man in the corner of the waiting room reading a magazine silently. “Baby,” she breathes out. “It’s Wynonna.”

She hears Waverly’s sharp inhale. “Is the baby-”

“On its way,” Nicole says quickly. “We’re at the hospital now, and her contractions are one ‘Sweet Child o’ Mine’ apart. The single version,” she adds.

“I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean,” Waverly says slowly.

Nicole stamps her foot impatiently. “Five minutes. Five minutes, and she’s getting set up in a room, and my mom is with her, but she probably won’t stay, and Wynonna is  _ really _  angry with Doc, and-”

“ _ Nicole _ ,” Waverly snaps. “Get it together.”

Nicole takes a deep breath. “Okay,” she whispers.

“I’m going to call Gus and pick her up, okay?” Waverly says, her voice softer. “Then I’m going to come over to the hospital. It won’t take long.” She pauses. “Wynonna needs you to be strong. I’ll be there soon,” she promises. The phone clicks, and Nicole listens to the dial tone for a minute before she hangs up the line.

She stands in the middle of the waiting room, blinking. “An actual baby,” she breathes out. She starts to pace - one, two, three, four, turn sharply, and back again.

A man sitting in the corner smiles hesitantly at her. “First time?”

Nicole opens and closes her mouth soundlessly.

“I was nervous my first time, too. But after the third, it all kind of settles.” He nods towards the hallway. “We were just passing through, and my wife realized she was just about to push a kid out in my station wagon. It’s new, so we stopped in.”

“Oh,” Nicole breathes out. “That’s… congratulations.”

The man nods. “You’ll be fine. My wife only broke my hand the one time.”

Nicole’s hand twitches involuntarily.

The man notices. “Just don’t let her get a grip on your fingers, is all.” He smiles at something over her shoulder. “Go on. I think it’s time.”

Nicole turns, eyes wide. Doc smiles hopefully at her. “She is all set. I was going to-”

“Go, go,” she rushes. She follows him out of the waiting room into the hallway, taking his hat from his hands. “I’ll wait out here, for Waverly and Gus.”

Doc takes a deep breath, his hand resting on the door. “Thank you, Nicole. For getting us here.”

Nicole shrugs a shoulder, pushing her hand into her pocket. “All I did was drive the car.”

“That is not what I mean, and I believe you know that,” he says quietly.

Nicole kicks at the tiled floor. “Well, if you know that I know that, but I’m not mentioning it, why don’t you do the same?”

Doc wrinkles his nose, his eyes confused for a moment before he nods sharply. “Right. Of course.”

Nicole winks. “Go. I’ll be here.”

He slips into the room, and Nicole stands in the hallway alone, staring at the white walls and the black and white tiled floors. She remembers being here when Nathan had his accident, pacing back and forth while the doctors worked, clutching her mom’s hand. She doesn’t sit down now, too many thoughts in her head. She’s running through a series of songs, all of them with ‘baby’ in the title, and she comes to a full stop when she realizes she forgot to ask Waverly to bring the ‘I Stay Up Late’ mixtape she’d made for this exact moment.

She thumbs the spare change in her pocket and debates trying to call again, but a loud scream and a crashing noise stop her. She looks up at the door with wide eyes as Doc comes crashing back into the hallway. His hair is everywhere and his hat is missing; he stumbles a few steps before righting himself.

“She is... “ He straightens his shoulders. “She has requested the absence of my presence. Something about this being all my fault.”

Nicole tries to fight the laugh bubbling inside her chest, but she can’t.

Doc grabs her hand, sliding a folded piece of paper into it gently. Her curls her hand around it. “Give this to her, please.”

Nicole looks over her shoulder. “You want… You want me to go in there?”

Wynonna screams again, loudly. It sounds like the noises they used to imagine would come from the old Wright property by the salt flats; hysterical and pained.

“She will not allow me past the threshold,” Doc says, his eyes heavy. “I respect her wishes, even if I do not agree with them. But I need her to know…” He shakes his head. “I need her to know this. So, if you do not mind…”

Nicole sighs. “Fine,” she concedes. She takes a deep breath. “Fine. Waverly was going to pick up Gus and come right over, okay? I think she was going to call the bank and tell Chrissy, and you know she’s going to tell Perry, and then call the boys and-”

Wynonna screams.

Doc backs up anxiously, his hands fluttering in front of him without his hat on.

“You were once in charge of the Blue Devils,” Nicole reminds him. “People feared you.”

“I do believe people were afraid of Wynonna,” he admits, eyes darting towards the door.

“Men,” Nicole mutters as knocks lightly on the door. She waits for someone to acknowledge her, but nothing comes. She pokes her head in slowly. “Is it safe for Doc to come back?”

A plastic cup crashes into the wall near her face.

“I’ll take that as a ‘no,’ then,” she says, slipping into the room with one last look over her shoulder.

Wynonna looks nearly feral - her hair is sweat-soaked and her face is red. She’s gripping the rails of the bed so tightly that her knuckles are white. Nicole holds her hands up in surrender, the piece of paper Doc gave her outstretched.

“I have something for you, from him,” Nicole says.

Wynonna bears her teeth. “I already  _ have _  something from him. And let me tell you,” she spits. “I’d rather have contracted an STD than do this.”

Nicole winces. She knows Doc has his ear pressed up against the door, listening in. “It’s a note,” she clarifies. “From Doc. He wanted you to have it.”

“I want him to have this baby,” Wynonna growls. Another wave of pain hits and she screams, her whole body bearing down.

The Labor and Delivery nurse peeks under the dressing gown Wynonna has on and smiles. “Get ready to push.”

“ _ Push _ ?” Wynonna and Nicole ask at the same time.

“This baby is coming, sweetie,” the nurse says.

Nicole hurries the last few meters to Wynonna’s side, pressing the note into her hand. “Read it,” she says. “Please.”

Wynonna glares at her for a moment before she unfolds the note, reading it over. “He… He…” Her eyes start to well, red at the edges and wet in the corners. Wynonna holds the note up for Nicole to read.

_ I am all in _ , it says in Doc’s looping script.

Something in Nicole’s chest breaks and she swallows hard.

Wynonna sobs once, dropping her head back against the pillow behind her. Tears stream silently down her face, and she grips Nicole’s hand tightly, her nails cutting into Nicole’s palm. She sucks in her bottom lip, trying to hold back as another wave of pain ripples through her body.

Nicole looks back at the door, then at Wynonna again. “Doc!” she shouts.

The door kicks open instantly and Doc is in the room, his coat billowing behind him like a movie star for a moment. His eyes are wild as he looks around, finally settling on Nicole.

Nicole nods at Wynonna’s other side.

Wynonna is still laying back on the bed, her eyes closed and tears streaming down her cheeks. The note is crushed in her hand, but Doc picks it up gently and cradles it in his own. Wynonna’s eyes flutter for a moment before they open.

“You mean it?” Wynonna asks, her words thick.

Doc nods silently.

“Because-because you have to mean it,” Wynonna continues. “We can’t… We can’t leave the baby. Ever. We have to be-”

“I am all in,” Doc says firmly. “I swear it.”

Nicole winces a little as Wynonna’s grip tightens on Doc’s hand. She can hear the man from the waiting room telling her not to let Wynonna get a lock on her fingers. Wynonna holds out her other hand, looking at Nicole.

“All in,” Nicole breathes out. “Okay.”

“Okay,” Wynonna says sharply. She looks up at the nurse. “Thundercats are go.”

There’s screaming and swearing and Doc starts crying silently after a soft  _ pop,  _ his arm bending to accommodate the pain in his hand. Nicole follows the nurse’s orders, lifting here and moving there, nudging Doc to the side and helping Wynonna bring her legs back enough. A doctor comes in after a few minutes, smiling brightly and asking how everyone is doing.

Wynonna curses Doc and God and Gus and Nicole, damning them all to hell for eternity, but everyone moves around her, ignoring what she says.

Just as Nicole is sure her hand is going to be pulverized, crushed by a strength she didn’t know Wynonna had, Wynonna tenses, her teeth chattering. She lets loose a single scream and then there’s silence, broken a moment later by a loud wail.

“Congratulations,” the doctor says, holding up a small, red, wrinkled body. “It’s a girl.”

“A girl,” Doc says, crying. He wipes at his face. “A  _ girl _ .”

“Alice,” Wynonna says quickly, still panting. “We talked about Alice, after-”

“My mom,” Doc finishes. He hiccups. “I remember.” He reaches out to the baby, his hand hovering over her. “Are you still… Are you still in agreement.”

“John Henry, shut up,” Wynonna says. “Alice,” she tells the nurse.

The nurse scribbles it down on a piece of paper, her pen pausing. “And the middle name?”

Wynonna and Doc look at each other. Doc nods firmly and Wynonna starts to smile. “We wanted to name her after someone strong,” Wynonna says. “And we talked for a long time about who that person would be.”

Nicole looks down at Alice.  _ A girl _ , she thinks.  _ Waverly is going to be so excited _ .

“If it was a boy, his name was going to be Curtis Henry,” Wynonna admits.

Nicole feels something pulse in her chest. “That would have been a good name.”

“And then we thought, if it’s a girl, who do we know that’s strong?” The corner of Wynonna’s mouth turns up. “So we decided on Michelle.”

Nicole frowns a little. “Michelle?”

“Valdez,” Wynonna clarifies. “Her name is Michelle Valdez and it… it just sounds good, doesn’t it?”

Nicole tips her head to the side, thinking. “I… I guess so? Alice Michelle sounds…” She rolls the name around in her mouth. “It sounds good.”

“But then we thought, we needed someone who was  _ strong _  and more, right?” Wynonna looks back at Doc. “Valdez is more than just strong, but… We wanted  _ the strongest _ . And the most loyal. And kindest and most caring and just  _ amazing _ ?” She pauses. “And has good taste in music.”

Nicole snorts. “Valdez has sh-  _ crap _  taste in music.”

Wynonna grins. “We know. Which is why we decided on Alice Nicole.”

Nicole opens her mouth, her hand going slack on the bed rail. “You… You what?”

“Alice Nicole Holliday,” Wynonna says. “Named after her grandmother. And her aunt, who is my best friend in the whole world. I couldn’t…” Wynonna takes a deep breath. “I  _ wouldn’t _  have done this without you.”

Nicole scrubs a hand down her face, trying to focus. “But that’s…”

“Listen,” Wynonna says slowly. Nicole looks up, meeting her eyes. “I can’t always be the best friend in the world, okay? I can’t always say ‘I love you’ or do any of the kind of stuff Chrissy and Rosita do for Waverly.” She inhales sharply. “But I can name my daughter after the one person in the world who has  _ always _ , always kept me on track and kept me sane. So.” She smiles crookedly. “So let me do that, okay?”

“Okay,” Nicole whispers. She touches Alice’s forehead, brushing her thumb across the small wrinkle there. “Hi, Alice. I’m your aunt, Nicole.”

Doc reaches over and squeezes her arm gently.

“Oh, wow,” Waverly breathes out.

Nicole looks up, smiling as Waverly comes into the room, Gus on her heels. Wynonna shifts a little, wincing, and Doc helps her sit a little higher, the small bundle cradled against her chest.

“Ten fingers, ten toes, and not wearing a leather jacket,” Wynonna says, her voice tinted with disappointment. “I was hoping she’d be wearing a leather jacket.”

“ _ She _ ,” Gus says quietly.

Wynonna smiles widely. “Yeah.  _ She _ .”

“It’s a girl,” Waverly whispers. “A little girl.”

“Alice,” Doc says, his voice strangled. “After my mother.”

“Alice,” Waverly repeats, reaching out to brush her fingertip down the curve of a small foot sticking out of the pale yellow hospital blanket.

“Alice Nicole,” Wynonna says.

Waverly’s eyes widen and she looks at Nicole. “After…”

“Unless you found out they changed Mom’s name to something ridiculous?” Wynonna snorts softly. “Yes, after your wife.”

“Oh,” Waverly whispers. She wipes at her eyes, laughing quietly. “Wow.”

“Is she not the most precious thing you’ve ever seen?” Doc asks softly.

“Why’re we whispering?” Wynonna asks, her voice booming through the quiet.

Alice lets out a single cry and Wynonna winces, looking guilty.

Gus brushes some of Wynonna’s hair back behind her ear and looks down at Alice, smiling in a way Nicole hasn’t seen since before Curtis died. “You did it,” she says. She frames Wynonna’s face with her hands, staring at her. “You did so great, honey.”

Wynonna’s eyes start to well, and she blinks rapidly, trying to clear the tears. “I did?”

“Oh, yes,” Gus breathes. “Yes, you did.” She kisses the top of Wynonna’s head.

Nicole feels Waverly’s hand slip into her own, their fingers lacing together.

“You forgot this,” Waverly says, lifting her purse up off her shoulder. She pulls out Nicole’s Walkman and a plastic cassette case.

“You remembered,” Nicole says. She kisses the top of Waverly’s head. She takes the Walkman and opens it, sliding the mixtape into the deck and closing it with a snap. It’s not her radio, and the volume won’t be loud, but she thumbs the volume dial all the way up and presses play, ears straining to pick up the start of the mixtape. She rests her hand on the end of the bed, Waverly tucked into her side. Gus kisses Wynonna’s forehead again, smiling at Doc.

“Welcome to the world, Alice Nicole Holliday,” she says as Guns N’ Roses starts playing.

“ _ She's got a smile that it seems to me reminds me of childhood memories, where everything was as fresh as the bright blue sky _ ,” Doc sings along softly.

“Now and then, when I see her face, she takes me away to that special place.”

“ _ And if I'd stare too long _ ,” Wynonna joins in. “ _ I'd probably break down and cry. _ ”

Alice stretches and yawns and settles back down, eyes closed. She curls her little hand around Wynonna’s finger.

“ _ Oh, oh, oh, sweet child o' mine. _ ”


End file.
